A Way Back Home
by justalotoffeelings
Summary: Max rides out of the Citadel on a stolen bike, and he means to stay away. But that's where he ends up, despite his best intentions. (A story about reunions, Furiosa and Max being drift compatible, and the Wives-turned-Sisters kicking ass in their own individual ways.)
1. Wayfaring Stranger

Max rides out of the Citadel on a stolen bike, and he means to stay away.

He leaves because he has to – standing beside Furiosa on the hood of Joe's car, he's already champing at the bit, uneasy with the crowds, the _crush_. He's moving before he quite knows what he's doing – he thinks, later, it might be more from habit than choice. There'd been other places in other times, half-remembered ghost towns elsewhere in the waste, and other people he'd stopped to help ( _tried to help_ , one ghost spits back) but he'd left them too. He left them all. Better that way. Stay too long in one place and the ghosts start to gather. Stay too long and there might be more ghosts to add to his list.

Max rides out of the Citadel because its standard protocol, its what he does, and it's what's best for them all, anyway. He doesn't want to bring the ghosts there. Not to that place, that new green place, which the Wives had dared to call their future, where Furiosa had dared to lay her hope. He doesn't want to see the specters gather in the doorways, congregating in this new, green, _good_ place, like they did in the dark corners of his mind. Besides, Furiosa had _nodded_ at him, smiling, raised up on the platform like a conqueror, a god, and it had felt like understanding, a blessing, permission. Whatever it had been, he'd taken it and run.

So Max rides out of the Citadel on a stolen bike, and he means to stay away.

And he does – for a week, then a month, then half a year, until the days blur into one long cycle of _survive, survive, survive_ , and he half thinks the Citadel was just a dream. Somewhere along the way the voices in his head become more real than the memory of Furiosa and the Wives. The Girl is at his side, waking or sleeping, mostly mute, except when the dreams get real bad. And they do – oh they do – but he's used to it, after all these years, and his demons are as familiar to him as the shimmering wasteland horizon. He feels himself slipping, his mind teetering on the brink of something not-quite-human, not-quite-Max, something from before-the-Citadel, but he's too busy surviving to fight the decline. The ghosts keep him company, keep his reflexes sharp, even when he doesn't meet anyone flesh and blood for weeks on end.

Max rides out of the Citadel on a stolen bike, and he means to stay away.

Never mind that he never wanders too far east, roaming up and down the mountains, across the Flats and back again, _survive, survive, survive_ , but never north, never south, like something in the west is calling to him, some siren song of the wasteland. There's the unsettling feeling that he left something behind. _Like leaving the house without your keys – no no no no._ But he never had much to begin with, and his car is gone, so he does his best to ignore the phantom discomfort. He has enough phantoms to deal with, anyway.

Max rode out of the Citadel on a stolen bike, and he _meant_ to stay away.

But that's where he ends up, despite his best intentions.

It's necessity that does it – necessity in the form of a bullet in his shoulder, the mangled remains of his leg brace, and a raiding party on his tail that he just can't shake. They sneak up on him in the night, make the mistake of thinking three men are enough to hold him down while they hack off his brace for salvage, and end up with three corpses for their trouble. Max is back on his bike and speeding across the waste while they're still roaring in outrage, but not before a well-aimed bullet lodges itself square in the meat of his shoulder. The pain is bad, but capture is worse, and he pushes his bike as fast as it will go.

He rides for the Red Rills, hoping his bike will give him an advantage in the hilly terrain, but any edge he gains in speed is lost in guzzoline. The sun is rising somewhere behind him, throwing his shadow across the dust, and the shadows of his pursuers are looming larger and larger with every heartbeat. He hasn't got the time or the tank-capacity to play around. So he flies forward, the sloping terrain pointing him towards the western horizon.

There's somewhere safe to the west, he recalls, some half-remembered dream. _A green place_ , the ghosts whisper. _A good place._ _Better off without him._ _He meant to stay away_. Meant to do a lot of things, he thinks. His shoulder is throbbing. He's low on guzzoline. He can hear the war cries of the raiding party behind him.

The wind changes, and he hears the shout even over the roar of the motors – "At 'im, boys!"

He turns suddenly, drawing the heavy pistol he keeps in a holster across the handlebars, and fires over his shoulder at the pursuers. He sees them all now, spread out behind him; four bikes and a car, all light and manoeuvrable and built for speed, the closest only twenty metres back. His first few shots take them by surprise, sending one of the bikes swerving straight into a sandbank. Then Max is facing front again, speeding forward, eyes fixed on the horizon in search of a half-remembered silhouette.

He spots it, after what seems like hours, as the raiders scream abuse at him and hurl lances that never quite reach their mark. The hulking mass of the place he thought he'd dreamed, crouched in the distance like a tiny imperfection on the pockmarked face of the wasteland. A stronghold – a citadel – The Citadel. There's a whining sound from somewhere behind him, and Max ducks his head, watching a metal-tipped lance go flying past his face to slam into the sand. They've closed the gap. _Survive, survive, survive_. He just needs a little more time.

He turns back and fires again, hits the windscreen of the car once, twice, three times, swerves wildly to avoid another lance, leans forward over the handlebars to coax a little more speed from the bike. A lance grazes his cheek, breaking the skin, but when Max looks towards the Citadel it's closer than it was before. He reloads the pistol one handed, turns again and fires, turns back and swerves. Reload, turn, fire, turn, swerve. Ignore the pain in his shoulder, the throbbing of his knee in its brutalised brace. _Survive, survive, survive_.

Then, a sound he does _not_ expect. The roar of the other motorbikes fades away, and the car engine too, till the only sound is the sputtering hum of his own bike and the wind in his ears. He looks over his shoulder to see the raiding party rolling to a stop in the middle of the plain, shouting and shaking their fists at him as they fade into the distance. Had they given up? Wandered too far out of their own territory? Lost interest in their quarry? Whatever the reason, Max is not about to waste the opportunity. He grunts in satisfaction and turns back to face the Citadel.

He barely has a chance to register the ground falling away in a sheer drop less than ten metres in front of him, and then The Girl is there, ghost eyes wide and tiny hands held up to stop him.

 _Watch out for the fall, Pa!_

Max wrenches savagely on the brakes, feels the back wheel lift off the ground, and then he is flying over the handlebars and skidding across the sand – _sand in his eyes, burning like fire_ – thrown over the edge by the force of his momentum. For one long, dream-like heartbeat he is falling. He sees the ghosts gathering on the ground below, reaching up to welcome him. _Survive, survive, survive_. He sees The Girl, standing right in the middle, pale eyes wide in her dirty face. _Look at that cliff, Pa! It's a long way d-_

He hits the side of the crag and the world goes black.


	2. Prodigal Son

They're having breakfast when the news arrives, a simple meal of corn and beans, the latest of Dag's crops. It's quiet in the mess hall, just Furiosa and the Wives-turned-Sisters sitting at the head of a long stone table – not like the frenetic, rowdy crowds at lunchtime, when the Wretched-turned-People (a different group every day) were invited up into the Citadel to talk and eat shoulder to shoulder with their leaders. Capable's idea, of course – her token brand of compassionate practicality had infiltrated all aspects of the running of their home.

"If we start _treating_ them like people, they'll _be_ people," she'd said firmly.

Furiosa had thought of their half-feral Fool and nodded her silent agreement.

But now the rowdiest thing in the room was Cheedo's laughter as Toast complained good-naturedly about her crew, and the quiet murmur of Capable and Dag's voices as they discussed their plans for improving the walls. Baby Angharad babbled happily on Dag's knee. The early morning light filtered in through high, narrow windows cut into the rock, setting the yellow stone of the walls ablaze and chasing the chill of the night air from Furiosa's bones. Soon she'd be needed in the council chamber, or down near the water pumps, or out on the walkways, but for now it was enough to let the voices of the Sisters wash over her.

"Commander, there's news."

Furiosa looked up from her bowl to see one of the lookouts, an ex-Wretched named Blent, standing in the doorway. He looked at ease, surveying the room languidly with his deep-set eyes, so Furiosa didn't immediately leap to her feet ready to beat off an attack. There had been several of them, in the beginning, seceders from Gas Town or the Bullet Farm that had done their fair share of damage, but Furiosa and the Sisters and the People were still standing.

Furiosa inclined her head. "Report."

"Gadlet spotted something on our borders, few minutes back."

"Something?" Toast repeated dubiously.

Blent shrugged his wizened old shoulders. "Gadlet's the one that saw it, you'd best talk to her."

Pushing herself up from the table, Furiosa turned to look at the girls. "If anyone needs me, tell them where I am." They all nodded and started cleaning up their plates. Baby Angharad gurgled a laugh as Dag hefted her onto her shoulder. It seemed the day's work had officially begun.

The halls and corridors of the Citadel Proper passed in companionable silence as Blent led the way up to the lookout. The settlement was just coming alive, as the People and War Boys awoke and went about their various jobs. They passed a few on the stairs, a War Pup running an errand who almost tripped over himself in his haste to get out of Furiosa's way, a former Milking Mother called Orara who smiled warmly and murmured greetings as they passed. By the time they made it out onto the walkways Furiosa could hear the echo of dozens of voices and footfalls behind them.

The sun was almost blinding after the torch-lit dimness of the corridors. Furiosa raised her flesh hand against the glare, enjoying the cool breeze blowing in from the west, and took a brief, dizzying glance at the ground below. The People looked like ants down there, scurrying out from the shadow of the massive rock structure they called the Slab, which squatted across from the Citadel Proper. Many of them, those well enough to volunteer, were moving towards the walls – Furiosa has suggested their construction while she was still lying in bed recovering from the beating she'd taken on the Fury Road. Until they could solidify alliances they needed to make the Citadel defensible, she'd told the Sisters, or they'd be as good helpless against any attacking force. And the walls, even half-built, had been invaluable in resisting those initial raiding parties.

Blent lead the way over the chasm, ambling across the gently swaying rope bridge as if it were as good as solid ground. Furiosa did her best to keep her gaze pointed forward until they made it to the other side.

The lookout point was a small platform anchored to the side of the Slab, with an uninterrupted view to the east and south. There were several others like it perched at high points around the Citadel. Between them they covered every approach into the metropolis, making it very hard for anybody to sneak in from the wasteland. Gadlet turned her head to greet them as they stepped onto the platform.

"Morning, boss," the woman said, raising her spyglass in a salute. She sat in a little wooden chair in the middle of the lookout, the withered stump of her right leg propped up on an old crate and her crutches thrown haphazardly on the floor. She'd volunteered for lookout duty as soon as the call went out, declaring her eyes were the best in the Citadel. Furiosa had never had any reason to doubt her claim – Gadlet had spotted most of the early attacks.

"Blent said you saw something," Furiosa said, squinting out across the waste. The sun hovered above the horizon, a perfect white orb in the cloudless blue sky. To the south she could see the billowing smoke of Gas Town, a black smudge that shimmered in the heat like a mirage. Nothing looked particularly out of the ordinary. The desert was dangerous like that, Furiosa knew.

"Well, it weren't nothing." Gadlet pointed towards the east with one slender hand. "Hard to tell exactly from this distance, but it looked like some kind of chase, right on the edge of our territory."

"How many vehicles?"

The lookout shrugged. "Half a dozen maybe, too much dust to be sure. Couldn't even tell what tribe they were. But that's not why I called you up here. You know the ridge off in that direction?"

Furiosa nodded. It was a steep thing, not too high but dropping almost vertically to the plain below, acting as a sort of natural barrier on their western bank.

"Well, whatever they were chasing drove right off the edge."

"Intentionally or accidentally?"

"Dunno. Might've preferred the drop to capture by raiders. Might've just not seen it till it was too late." She snapped her spyglass open, training it on something Furiosa couldn't see. "If you look real hard you can sort of see something at the foot of the ridge."

She handed the glass over, but when Furiosa eventually found the right stretch of waste to look at all she could see was a hazy speck, dwarfed by the steep face of the ridge. Years of squinting into the sun hadn't done anything for her vision. She'd have to trust Gadlet.

When she lowered the spyglass Blent was watching her expectantly, waiting for orders. "Send Toast and her crew," she said at last. "If they're still alive we can help them before the Buzzards start circling. If they're dead we can salvage." They'd done this many times, this rescue-or-salvage routine. Most times there was nobody to save.

Blent nodded and took off across the walkway, leaving Furiosa to catch up in her own time. She took one last look out across the wasteland, thanked Gadlet, and turned back to face the Citadel. There was a lot of work to do.

* * *

Toast led the rescue party out of the gates, sitting astride a sturdy old bike she'd dubbed the _Lupa_. Her War Boys didn't name their vehicles – to them, that was still a tradition reserved for the most special of machines, not any old bike. But Toast had exalted in _owning_ something, in picking something out for _herself_ and scratching a name into the beaten-up metal of the bike's body, an expression of the autonomy she'd been so starved of.

She waved an arm over her head and the party made a sharp left, wheeling around in the dust to face the east. There was three other bikes and a car in her crew, five War Boys in all, who answered to her personally. She hadn't been officially elected to the position, exactly. Almost as soon as they'd retaken the Citadel Toast had started training with the War Boys, learning to fight with as many weapons as she could get her hands on, and drive as many vehicles as she could find. The War Boys had been cautious, at first, wondering if they were allowed to hit her when they sparred, but months of training had worn down the awkwardness until Toast was left with five…well, she wasn't sure _what_ they were. Soldiers? Comrades? She might have said blood brothers, if her nose didn't wrinkle at the sentimentality. Soon they were working so well as a team that it seemed natural for Furiosa to treat them as a crew.

"Two klicks out," shouted Skince, a sturdily-built War Boy with an intricate handlebar designed carved over his brow. He pointed out to the horizon. Toast could just make out the hazy shape of the ridge in the distance. She hoped they got there before the Buzzards.

Their vehicles ate up the distance to their target, and soon they were skidding to a halt in the shadow of the ridge. Toast pressed her lips together. She could see someone lying face down in the sand, the dented wreckage of a bike resting nearby. Shallow furrows in the dirt showed where they'd rolled down the side of the ridge.

Toast dismounted and drew her pistol, training it on the body as she walked forwards. She thought it might be a man, from the size and shape, dressed in old, dusty leathers. He'd been shot, she saw, and his left arm was twisted at an alarming angle. Dead? A quick nudge with the toe of her boot failed to elicit a noticeable response.

"Careful, Toast," Skince warned. "Might be faking."

Toast didn't think so. After a moment's hesitation she crouched down and felt for a pulse. _Steady heartbeat. Alive_. She pushed the body onto its side. A face came into view, crusted with sand, scraped and bruised and half obscured by hair.

Toast sat back on her heels. "Holy shit."

"What is it?" hissed Skince.

A chorus of War Boy voices echoed him. "What is it? What is it, Toast?"

Toast allowed herself a small smile. "It's the Fool."

 _It's Max_.

* * *

 **I had to do a little bit of research for this chapter. I looked at some images of the Citadel in-movie and there didn't appear to be any walls, but if I'm wrong I apologise! Trying to figure out how the Citadel functions is really fun!**

 **I'm super excited to write the next chapter! [whispers] I just want to see my family re-united.**


	3. Lucky

The War Pup found her just as she was walking back from the western wall. She spent as much time among the People as she could, working or talking or just listening, keeping a finger on the pulse of the Citadel. She refused to be inaccessible as Immortan Joe had been, and it was a lot harder to deify someone who was elbow deep in engine grease or barking at the children to keep their fingers out of the machinery. After she'd left the lookout her morning had been spent assisting construction at the wall, where People and War Boys and War Pups alike laboured to raise a barrier against the wasteland.

The stairs up to the Citadel Proper were freshly cut, zigzagging upwards until they plunged straight into the rock face and inside the fortress. The initial decision to destroy the elevator platform had been discarded – as grand as the gesture would have seemed, there were People on the ground who needed assistance to reach the Citadel Proper. Now it was regularly used to ferry people up to the mess hall or the gardens or one of several infirmaries Cheedo and the Vuvalini Yarra had established over the past few months.

Furiosa had barely placed one foot on the stairs before a War Pup was by her side, panting from the effort of his run.

"Sister Cheedo needs you in the small infirmary," he gasped. "Says it's important. Says it's Max."

Furiosa blinked. _Blessed Mother_. The Fool had come back.

She took the stairs two at a time, mind racing as she made for the infirmary. The chase that Gadlet had spotted on their borders – that had to have been Max, running from raiders or bandits or worse. And Toast's crew must have brought him back in. _Cheedo said it was important_. She doubled her pace.

The infirmary door was closed when Furiosa reached it. She entered as quietly as she could. Inside there was a modest sized room, with half a dozen beds intended mostly for patients who needed peace and quiet. Only one of the beds was occupied at the moment – Max lay stretched out on his back, eyes closed and chest rising slowly with rasping breaths. Toast was there, leaning against the wall. Cheedo hovered over him, her hair tied back in a loose bun, looking down worriedly at the Fool's face.

"There you are." Cheedo all but sighed in relief when she saw Furiosa standing in the doorway. "I thought it would be good if you were here when he woke up. He got an awful lot of sand in his eyes, I'm not sure how well he's going to be able to see. I haven't even had a chance to get that bullet out of his shoulder but-" She broke off with a start. "I think he's waking up."

The alarm bells in Furiosa's head started ringing just a fraction too late.

The voices were bad this time.

 _Max_ , they whispered insistently. _Max, where are you? Where did you go? You said you would help us, Max!_ _Look how that turned out._

He saw them all, skeletal faces covered in blood, the people he couldn't save. People he'd loved, people he'd given his word to. _We trusted you, Max_. He saw ghosts so old he couldn't even remember who they were. He saw men and women. He saw children. _Think of the children, Max_. He saw The Girl with her ghost eyes, disappearing under the wheels of a convoy he could've stopped. _No no no no no_. He saw a pregnant Wife lose her grip on the war rig, and a War Boy with hope in his smile die in a fiery explosion. _You could've saved us, Max!_

His eyes shot open, and suddenly there was only pain.

"Max!"

He struck out with a sudden surge of adrenaline, hitting something soft and warm. _Human. Raiders? Buzzards_? _Worse?_ The pain in his eyes was almost unbearable, burning like someone had taken hot coals and forced them under his eyelids. He couldn't see a damned thing, just a red haze populated by blurry shapes that swam sickeningly when he tried to focus.

"Max!"

There were hands on his chest, trying to push him back. He felt metal against his skin, and long-buried nightmares came flooding back from the dark recesses of his memory. _Needles pressed into his body, a feeling like fire across his back, dozens of hands holding him down._ _Look out, Max!_ He snarled and pushed back. Raising his left arm brought on a wave of fresh agony, but he had enough frenzied strength left to shove past whoever was holding him down and get his feet under him before he fell to the floor. _Survive, survive, survive_.

"Max, stop!"

He lurched sideways, slamming into something solid with enough force to set his ears ringing. The voices were screaming at him, crying out his sins over and over or howling for his death. _Look at us, Max! Look at us! Where did you go? You said you'd help us. You said you'd come back, Max! Look at us!_ He couldn't have looked at them if he wanted to. He couldn't see a _damned thing_. His hands closed around something, some piece of furniture, and he held it in front of him like a shield, his good arm shaking from the effort and his bad arm hanging limply at his side. He could hear people moving towards him, felt rage and fear and helplessness clawing at his throat. _Why couldn't he see why couldn't he see why couldn't he-_

"Fool!"

Max froze, every aching muscle in his body going rigid. His ragged breathing was loud over the pounding of blood in his ears. _He knew that voice_. He knew that _name_ , from some half-remembered dream of a green place and a war rig and a woman with steel eyes who called him _Fool_ when he was being stubborn. His thoughts moved sluggishly, pushing past the fear and the pain, but he got there eventually.

 _Furiosa_.

He felt his arm drop almost against his will, and after a moment his shield was taken gently from his hands. He tried not to twitch at the movement, but his nerves were shot and he could still hear the dead whispering in the back of his head and he couldn't bloody _see_.

His voice, when he found it, sounded like a rusted thing, some broken down car left to corrode in the desert. " _Where?_ "

Furiosa sounded the same as she always had – steady and certain. "The Citadel," she told him. "Infirmary. Three floors up. We spotted you on our borders, came and picked you up and brought you back." There was a moment's pause, and then in a softer tone: "It's safe here, Max."

The sound of his name spoken aloud made his hackles rise. _Who told them how do they know what do they want how did they-_ He shook his head to clear it, dredging up month-old memories he'd abandoned in the waste. _He'd_ told her. She'd been probably-dying and he'd told her because his blood hadn't felt like enough. So he'd given Furiosa his name. He forced himself to relax again, steadying himself against the wall at his back. _Safe_ , she'd said. He trusted her.

"Max." It was more a croak than a word, but he nodded tiredly all the same, sagging against the wall in sudden exhaustion.

 _My name is Max_.

* * *

Furiosa let out a breath she hadn't known she'd been holding. Cheedo was right – he obviously couldn't see very well, if at all. His bloodshot eyes were fixed somewhere over her shoulder, and he twitched violently at even the slightest sound. She hardly recognised him, their Fool, with his hair grown long and his beard grown in. His skin, where it was visible, looked raw and scraped. His left arm hung awkwardly by his side. There was blood soaking through his shirt at the shoulder – the bullet Cheedo had mentioned – and he was nursing his left leg, where the brace that Furiosa remembered was hanging in a broken tangle. Not in good shape, she decided.

She told him as much and received a grunt in reply. The side of her mouth twitched upwards.

"Can we look you over?"

Max's head snapped up. _We?_

"Just me and a couple of the girls. Toast and Cheedo." _Do you remember?_

There was a long, tense pause, and Furiosa wondered if he even _knew_ their names, but then he frowned to himself and nodded, and shifted his weight away from the wall.

Almost immediately his bad leg collapsed under him. Furiosa took one long stride forward and caught him before he hit the ground, and then Toast was on his other side and they were helping him towards the bed while Cheedo raced around straightening everything Max had knocked over. He was shivering, Furiosa realised, but whether from exhaustion or shock or pain she wasn't sure.

"We're lucky we found you," Toast said quietly.

Max only hummed low in his throat, but Furiosa understood his meaning well enough.

 _I'm lucky you found me_.

* * *

 **Technically this was only half a reunion, because Dag and Capable aren't there yet. But never fear! The fam will be back together again in the next chapter!**

 **To everyone that has left kudos or comments, thank you from the bottom of my heart! Feedback is honestly the most encouraging thing in the world, and I'm so pleased to know there are people actually enjoying what I write! Keep on keeping on :)**


	4. A Little More Mad

The bed they led him to was the softest thing Max had felt in years, but he was in far too much pain to appreciate it. He could feel the cold weight of Furiosa's metal arm as she kept pressure on the bullet wound, and that helped to ground him a bit, but his shoulder was screaming in agony and his bad leg was throbbing and he thought gouging his eyes out with a dull spoon might be less painful than whatever was currently wrong with them. Not to mention that they still weren't fucking _working_.

He closed his eyes, opened them again, unsure if he preferred the agonizing red haze or the equally agonizing nothingness of the dark. He wanted to tear at his skin, maddened that he couldn't see, feeling like a caged animal with a blindfold on to stop him from bolting. His good hand moved involuntarily to his face, scrubbing at his eyes even as they burned.

"Please, Max, don't do that."

Something brushed lightly against his cheek, the feathery touch of gentle fingers. He flinched away.

"It's just me. It's Cheedo. One of the Wives, do you remember? Do you remember me from the Fury Road?"

 _Cheedo_. It took him a long moment to put a face to the name. He remembered wide, frightened eyes and a slip of a girl half-hiding behind her friends. He'd thought of her as the Waif until he'd learnt her name. (He'd given them _all_ nicknames in the beginning, for lack of anything better to call them inside his own head. Red and Boots and Owl-Eyes and Mother. War Boy. Steel Woman. And the Waif.) The girl that spoke to him now sounded older, more sure of herself. Max doubted she did much hiding anymore.

"What's wrong with me?" he growled. _Oh, Max,_ _what's not wrong with you?_ whispered the voices in his head.

"You got some sand under your eyelids when you fell down that ridge. I think it left scratches on the surface, on the…the _cornea_." He heard the soft rustling of paper, and Cheedo muttering under her breath. "If you leave your eyes alone and wash them regularly they should heal in a few days."

 _A few days_. It sounded as good as a prison sentence. A few _hours_ of this might be enough to drive him mad. _You're already mad_ , laughed the voices. _More mad_. Panic, acrid and stifling as ash, loomed at the edges of his consciousness. His discomfort must have shown – Furiosa's grip on his shoulder tightened marginally, a reassuring weight that reminded him he was amongst…friends? The word seemed foreign, as disused as his voice had been, but nothing else more suitable came to mind. _Friends_. He forced himself to breathe steady, clenching his fingers in the fabric of the bedspread. He couldn't see. It was troubling, but not immediately life threatening.

 _Hell,_ he thought tiredly, _what's a little more madness_.

* * *

Toast snuck out quietly once it was clear she wasn't needed. No doubt she had War Boys to train, or vehicles to repair. She'd never liked the infirmary anyway, baulking at the smell for all that she was a solider now. Cheedo had always found that funny, in a strange sort of way.

Getting the bullet out of Max's shoulder was Cheedo's main priority. Even under the tan and the grime and the road rash she could tell he was turning pale. She flitted around getting her instruments ready, preparing needle and thread and bandages, trusting Furiosa to watch her patient. He seemed more settled with the commander's hand on his shoulder. Furiosa tended to have that effect. Cheedo had come to think of her as a (short-tempered, very stubborn) pillar of certainty amidst the often chaotic Citadel.

It had been obvious from the moment Toast and her Boys first brought Max in that his right shoulder was dislocated. She needed to fix that before she removed the bullet.

"I'm going to reset your shoulder," she told him. "It'll hurt."

Max grunted an affirmation. _What doesn't?_

She twisted it back into position with such speed that he only managed a strangled sort of wheeze before it was done.

Cheedo had never _asked_ to be a medic, in much the same way that Dag never _asked_ to be the Keeper, and Toast was never _elected_ as crew chief. Back in the beginning she'd attached herself to Yarra, the old Vuvalini who knew how to stitch broken people back together, and tentatively followed her down amongst the People three days after their return. It had been frightening at first – it shouldn't have been, they were _her people_ after all – but soon enough Cheedo was too busy to be intimidated.

"Be useful or be gone," Yarra had said brusquely when she'd first noticed Cheedo hovering by her shoulder.

Cheedo had looked long and hard at the hopeful, hurting people in front of her. She wondered if any of them recognised her. It had only been a year since Joe had dragged her from her home – a dirty little hovel she'd inherited from her father. But the Wretched – the _People_ , she'd corrected herself – hadn't rushed forward to reclaim her. They looked right back, marvelling and wary, shoulders hunched in exhaustion and suspicion, backs heavy with pain. She remembered what it was like, living in the shadow of the Citadel Proper, scrounging a living from the meagre scraps of food Joe let trickle down from his gardens. _These were her people._ She'd set her jaw and picked up a roll of bandages.

"Teach me," she'd told Yarra. And Yarra had taught.

With Max's shoulder reset Cheedo could focus on removing the bullet. It was an effort getting him to shrug out of his shirt with one arm still fairly useless, but after a lot of careful manoeuvring Cheedo was left staring at the broad, scarred plane of Max's back.

There were… _tattoos_. Lines upon lines of wonky black text, stretching from his neck down to the waistband of his trousers. It was all upside down, and half of it was smeared with blood from the bullet wound, but Cheedo could still read the middle lines well enough – O-NEGATIVE. HI-OCTANE. UNIVERSAL DONOR. _Blood bag_ , Nux had called him, all those months ago on the Fury Road. She shared a look with Furiosa; the commander's mouth was pressed into a thin line. They all knew what it was to be branded.

Max shifted almost imperceptibly, straightening his shoulders as if to say _Get on with it_. Cheedo shook herself and braced one hand against his back. 'This is going to hurt as well," she murmured apologetically.

Compared to the fidgety War Boys and nervous People that Cheedo usually treated, Max was a model patient. The old leather jacket that Cheedo remembered – now discarded on the adjacent bed – seemed to have absorbed most of the bullet's impact, and Cheedo guessed it was buried less than a bolt deep. Still, Max's whole body went taught with pain as she dug it out. He growled something that sounded like " _Fuck_ " and twitched away instinctively.

"Sorry sorry sorry," Cheedo hissed, and then the bullet was out and she was hurrying to clean and stitch and bandage the wound before he lost any more blood.

"Done?" Furiosa asked. She had barely moved as Cheedo worked, standing over Max like some kind of sentinel.

"Done." Cheedo clambered off the bed with a sigh, laying down her roll of bandages, and touched Max's good shoulder lightly. "Now, I'll see if I can't find you something to eat, and then you should probably rest." She smiled brightly, for all that he couldn't see it. "Although I _know_ the others would love to see you first."

Max looked for a moment like he wanted to run, sightless eyes flicking left and right nervously. Cheedo realised abruptly how unsettling this must be for him – to wake up shot and bruised and _blind_ , surrounded by people after months alone in the desert. She wondered absently where he'd been all this time. She'd expected him to stay, back when they'd retaken the Citadel. They all had – except, of course, for Furiosa, who seemed unfazed by their Fool's sudden disappearance.

"I thought he liked us," Toast had frowned, and Furiosa had sighed.

"He needs time," she'd said quietly. "He's not built to settle. Not yet. Maybe never."

Looking at him now, Cheedo could see all the rough edges, the rawness that had pulled him back into the wasteland. But she remembered careful hands cradling Furiosa's head, and a panicked voice mumbling _No no no no_ like a prayer, and a man who delivered hope to them on a scrap of fabric marked with blood.

Cheedo hesitated for a moment, chewing her bottom lip, then took one of Max's calloused, scarred hands in her own. He went very still, eyes fixed blindly on her face.

"We'll look after you, you know," she told him earnestly. "You're safe here, just like Furiosa said. And you don't have to stay for long. Just till your eyes are better. I _promise_ we'll look after you."

"Uh." Max blinked. Hunched his shoulders. Cleared his throat uncomfortably. Then ducked a brief nod. "A few days," he rumbled grudgingly. "Not much choice about it. Can't bloody see."

Cheedo grinned, looking from Max to Furiosa and back again. "We can show you what we've done to the Citadel! Dag can give you a tour of the gardens, and the greenhouses and everything. Well, when your eyes are better, of course. You're gonna love them, there's so much _green_ , and-"

"Cheedo," Furiosa said gently, trying to hide a half-smile. "Maybe later."

"Oh." She flushed, embarrassed by her own excitement. "Sorry. I'll go see about that food."

She was halfway to the door when it swung open suddenly, and Capable and Toast came spilling into the infirmary, their arms laden with enough food for all six of them. Dag followed a few steps behind, balancing Angharad on one hip and smiling impishly.

"We heard there was a visitor," she said. "We brought the grub."

* * *

 **I'm so sorry for the wait, folks! This chapter was a struggle from beginning to end unfortunately. Hopefully things will go a little smoother from here on out!**

 **Once again, thank you from the bottom of my heart to everyone who has commented or given kudos. You're all wonderful and I love you.**


	5. Conversation

Max didn't say much as they ate, seemingly content to listen to the Sisters' animated conversations as he slurped clumsily at his bowl of stew. Cheedo had explained quickly about his eyes, making an admirable effort not to sound too pleased that he was staying.

Capable had no such reservations. "It'll be good to have you," she said with a smile. "You helped us get here, after all."

He looked uncomfortable with the praise, dropping his head and mumbling an approximation of _You're welcome_ into his bowl.

The Sisters chatted easily about the goings-on of the Citadel, occasionally breaking off to clarify something for Max, waiting for his slow nod of comprehension before they launched back into the conversation. They spoke of the walls, and of the gardens, and of the new pipe system that carried fresh water across the Citadel. Toast reported her crew's latest shenanigans, rolling her eyes as she spoke of an arm wrestling match gone out of control. Capable rattled off the names of the Pups recently inducted into the Blackthumbs, as proud as if they were her own children. Dag told them about plans for expanding the greenhouse, spearheaded by her second-in-command, a former Milking Mother called Laurel, and a formidable team of assistant gardeners.

Furiosa observed them from her spot on the bed beside Max, only interjecting when her input was asked for. It was good to hear the girls talking like this, summing up their accomplishments for a visitor's benefit – sometimes it was hard, when things got particularly chaotic, to see the big picture. To remember how much they'd achieved in only a few hundred days.

 _A few hundred days_. Had it been that long? She glanced sideways at Max. He was still pale, scowling down at his bowl like it had personally offended him (in what was probably an attempt to focus his eyes). She thought of the last time she'd seen the Fool – fading into the crowd like a mirage, a spirit of the road, face soft with weariness and something like regret. She hadn't begrudged him his departure. A part of her had expected it. A part of her knew he'd be back.

A part of her had guessed it would be like _this_ – his return dictated by necessity, as so much of his life had undoubtedly been. She wondered how long it would have taken him to come back of his own accord. _Maybe never_ , she'd told the girls, because her head was still ringing with _hope is a mistake_ even though she didn't quite believe it.

Max started fidgeting like he could read her thoughts.

"You alright?" she asked him, voice low so as not to disturb the Sisters.

"Mm."

It was hardly an answer, but Furiosa knew what it meant. He shifted awkwardly, and Furiosa caught a glimpse of his ruined leg brace. To say it was broken would be an understatement; one of the struts had been torn off completely, and the rest were bent as if someone had very enthusiastically taken a crowbar to them.

"I'll have a look at your brace later." It wasn't a question. Some things just needed to be fixed.

Max regarded her through sightless eyes and dipped his head. "Mm."

That was as good as a thank you. Furiosa smiled into her bowl of stew.

They sat in comfortable silence for another few minutes, listening to the Sisters, finishing their meals. It was the most relaxed Furiosa had felt in weeks – to Hell with the fact that there were a million and one things she could be doing instead of lounging around on a bed. She thought she could make an exception for the Fool who saved them all, and besides, the girls were enjoying themselves too.

Then baby Angharad, silent so far, decided to join the discussion, burbling nonsense words and tugging on her mother's hair in a plea for attention.

Max started, almost dropping his bowl.

"Now look what you've done, you little terror," Dag teased in mock-annoyance, prying tiny fingers from her braids. "You've scared our Fool."

Angharad, shameless as always, grinned her oblivious baby grin, and the Sisters all laughed. But Max's eyes were fixed somewhere in the distance, and all the tension that had leached out of his shoulders was suddenly back again. Furiosa felt the change in his mood as suddenly as a War Rig shifting gears. He looked like he'd seen a ghost.

She stood abruptly, stretching the kinks out of her spine. "Alright, I think its about time we let the patient get some rest."

The Sisters looked over at Max in confusion – saw that he had curled in on himself, eyes unfocused, hands turned to claws as he gripped the edge of the bed – and started to pack up wordlessly. They trusted Furiosa's judgement on this. Dag stepped out first, cradling Angharad against her chest. "Come on, tiny terror," Furiosa heard her whisper into the child's white-blonde hair. Toast and Capable went next, both frowning worriedly at Max. At last Furiosa and Cheedo were the only ones left.

Furiosa spoke his name, gentle but firm. He didn't reply, just shook his head like he was trying to clear it of cobwebs. She repeated it louder. " _Max_."

He glanced up sharply, all frayed nerves and haunted eyes, looking eerily like the man who'd woken from a nightmare beside her in the War Rig, almost three hundred days ago. He came back to himself like he always did, shrugging off the ghosts just as he had on the Fury Road, releasing his death grip on the bed.

"Dag's daughter," Furiosa said in way of explanation. _Not a ghost_ , she wanted to add. "Angharad. After Splendid."

Max was silent for a few moments, mulling that over. "S' good," he said eventually, and gave a slow nod. "Good name."

They left him there, once they were sure he was lucid again. There was a basin beside the bed in case he wanted to rinse out his eyes, and blankets if he got cold, and a lavatory two beds down that he could feel his way to if he needed. Max hummed his understanding and settled stiffly back against the pillows. Furiosa almost smiled at the sight of him; half covered in bandages, wild-looking in his unkemptness, obviously uncomfortable with the luxury of the bed. She'd offer him a bath at some point. Tomorrow maybe. When he wasn't so jittery. For now though, he needed rest.

They were halfway out the door before Max said anything, clearing his throat self-consciously before continuing. "I, uh…never said…thank you. For-" he made a vague gesture with his hands. _All of this_.

Cheedo answered for both of them, the warmth from her expression leaking into her voice. "No need."

Max nodded, cleared his throat again, making an effort to look more at ease.

"Get some rest," Furiosa said with an almost-smile that Max couldn't see, and closed the door behind them.

* * *

Max didn't think he'd sleep. Not here, with stone above his head and on all four sides, and who knew how many stairs between him and the nearest vehicle. Besides, it was the middle of the day, by the best estimate of his body clock. Sleeping during the day made you slow, dulled your reflexes. He'd rest, yes, because Furiosa had asked it of him, but sleep seemed an impossible task.

And yet – the infirmary was cool and quiet, and the pain in his knee and his shoulder and his eyes had faded to a dull ache, and his thoughts were growing more sluggish by the minute. He wondered abruptly if they'd drugged him. _No no no no_. Even half-awake, he grunted disdainfully at his own foolishness. _Remember where the hell you are._ Furiosa wouldn't do that, wouldn't cross that line, not without his permission. The drowsiness was just his body responding to its most recent abuse.

Only half against his will, he felt his blind eyes flicker closed.

The ghosts were waiting for him, as usual, just below the surface.

* * *

 **Next chapter should be up soon! Thank you so much for reading. And please, if you ever want a chat, don't hesitate to drop by my** **tumblr** **!**


	6. No Rest For the Weary

Max woke to the taste of blood in his mouth and the feeling of sand under his skin, and the horrible sensation that he couldn't breathe.

He'd dreamed of quicksand, thick and suffocating, and a legion of ghosts that watched him impassively as he drowned. The mire was filled with corpses that pulled at his limbs and gurgled accusations through sand-filled mouth even as they sank into the abyss. They had forced their rotting fingers down his throat. He almost retched at the thought.

Eager to distance himself from the nightmares, he kicked himself free of the blankets and rolled off the bed, swearing as a dozen different body parts flared in agony. A panicked fumble around the floor quickly located the basin; he plunged his head into the water without hesitation, losing what little breath he had in a startled gasp at the cold. He came back up spluttering, the nightmares still fresh in his mind.

 _Where are you Max?_

The voices seeped out from the murky archives of his memory, familiar and implacable as always. " _No_ ," he growled, squeezing his eyes shut, for all the good that did him. _No no no no_. Not now, while he was blind and immobile and could do fuck-all to distract himself. Frustration rose in him like a wave, so palpable he almost choked on it. He wanted to _see_ , for fuck's sake, to check his surroundings and get his bearings and scan for exits. He was hyper aware of the rock above his head, the weight of the Citadel pressing down on him like a death sentence, and the air of the infirmary was suddenly stale and dry as dust, as suffocating as the quicksand from his dream.

He needed to _breathe_.

He heaved himself up with a strangled snarl and lurched away from the basin, staggering in the direction of what he hoped was the exit. The room was a painful obstacle course for his shins and bare feet; by the time he finally found the door – rough, flaky wood beneath his fingers – he was sure he'd added significantly to his collection of scrapes and bruises. In his desperation he almost broke the damned thing down, rattling the handle with all his frenzied strength, cursing and swearing and spitting oaths, finally focusing enough to heave the door open and throw himself forward.

He stumbled out of the infirmary, dragging in ragged lungfuls of cool air like a dying man, steadying himself against the wall so he didn't sag to his knees. The air carried the tang of stone and metal and oil, but it was blessedly fresh in comparison to what he'd come from. It seemed the best thing he'd ever tasted.

Then he felt it – the slightest hint of a draft, brushing against his cheek like a phantom kiss. Before he quite knew what he was doing his feet had started moving of their own accord, carrying him towards the source of the draft like a thirsty dog to water, one hand running along the wall to keep himself grounded.

He wasn't sure how long he wandered, blind and only half lucid, staggering through the darkness. However long it was, his body felt like one enormous bruise by the time he was disturbed.

"Oh, shit."

Max almost jumped out of his skin, throwing himself up against the wall and raising both fists to ward off an attack. The voice had come from somewhere to his left, echoing strangely in the empty hallway. It sounded young.

"St-stay right there, I'll get the commander."

There was a pattering of footsteps quickly fading into the distance, and then Max was alone, still pressed up against the wall. His instincts – locked into fight or flight mode from the scare – screamed at him to run, his pulse beating out _survive, survive, survive_ on the inside of his skull. _Fool_ , cried the ghosts. _Scared of children. Remember where you are_. He shuddered, grit his teeth, and forced down the fear.

Soon enough he heard the footsteps again, accompanied by a low murmur of voices that he strained his ears to hear.

"…just walkin' around…middle of the night!…near scared me to death."

 _Middle of the night_. He'd slept for over half a day. No wonder he felt so unsteady.

Someone replied, too softly for him to make out the words, but he would've recognised that voice anywhere. _Furiosa_. Guilt mingled strangely with relief as he heard her footsteps stop in front of him.

"Max." She sounded wary. He wondered what he looked like, to put her on guard like that. More feral than usual, apparently. He could hear the question in her voice – _What the hell are you doing?_

What the hell _was_ he doing? " _Air_ ," he rasped.

Not his most articulate work, but it was all he could manage.

There was a long pause, broken only by Max's ragged breathing. He wondered if she'd send him back to the infirmary – stiffened at the thought. "Wait here," said Furiosa at last.

She was gone for less than a minute, returning quickly to drape something heavy and warm over his shoulders. "Cheedo will string me up if you catch cold," was all she said.

She took him gently by the arm, and Max let himself be led up sloping corridors and a flight of stairs that would have been an impossible obstacle if Furiosa wasn't supporting half his weight. He could feel the air growing blissfully cool, and the steady rhythm of their footsteps combined with the reassuring warmth of Furiosa's arm across his back lulled him back into a half daze. By the time they came to a stop his breathing had evened out, and the suffocating stillness of the infirmary seemed a distant nightmare.

"Better?" asked Furiosa.

Max nodded mutely. She had brought him someplace open, if the absence of echoes were anything to judge by. The breeze picked up, ruffling his too-long hair and making his eyes smart. It was good, although it set him shivering again. He could breathe.

"Where?" he mumbled.

"Inside the skull." She gave him the barest nudge forward. "Sit down, if you want. There's a wall behind you."

He sank to the floor in a grateful, inelegant heap, his bad leg sticking out awkwardly and his good shoulder pressed up against the rock face. He tugged the blanket closer, keeping his face open to the wind, and tried to picture their location. He remembered the skull vividly – how could he not? It had leered down at him like a malevolent deity as he'd tried to escape the Organic Mechanic's workshop. Its likeness was seared onto the back of his neck.

Onto Furiosa's neck as well, he knew, and she'd lived with it for a lot longer.

There was the soft rustle of fabric on stone, and then she'd dropped down to sit beside him, far enough that he didn't feel crowded, close enough that her shoulder brushed lightly against his own when she shifted. He realised that he hadn't felt the tell-tale metal of her prosthetic yet. He thought she might have taken it off. _Of course she has, Fool_ , whispered the ghosts. It was the middle of the night. She'd been asleep.

"Sorry," he said abruptly. "You were – sleeping. Sorry."

He felt her shrug. "Nice out here."

"Mm." He hoped she'd take that as the _thank you anyway_ it was meant to be.

"How are your eyes?" Furiosa asked.

He tried looking at her, hoping his vision had magically improved in the last few minutes. Nothing. Just the same angry blotches of red and orange that itched infuriatingly with every blink. He grunted. "Still can't see shit."

"Give it another day or two, should start getting better."

He nodded, though that reminder of the inevitable wait ahead of him made his insides roil.

They sat in silence like that for a while. Max focused on breathing in as much of the cool night air as he could, as if he could save it for later. His knee was aching from the climb up the stairs, and the sting in his shoulder suggested he'd pulled some of Cheedo's careful stitches, but it had been worth it.

Then Furiosa shifted, and cleared her throat. "Where did you go? After you left."

The question didn't startle him. The way she _asked_ it did. She sounded…wistful? Max worked that over in his mind, bemused, until he came up with a reasonable explanation – Furiosa was _restless_.

She'd fought like a demon for the Green Place (had bled for it, wept for it, had almost died for it), and Max knew (could _feel_ , somehow) that she was happy here. But there would always be a part of her that belonged out on the Fury Road, the burning sun beating down on her shoulders and dust billowing around the wheels of her vehicle. It was impossible to drive the wasteland for as long as Furiosa had without it becoming a part of you. He, of all people, knew that.

So he told her – haltingly, in as few words as he could manage, his voice still rough from misuse, gruff from self-consciousness – of the places he'd been, the way the wastes had shifted from sand to dirt to salt, marsh to mud to sand again – of the way the people had changed with the landscape, wary and hostile and bloodthirsty by turn – of ghost towns that had once been bustling, and new settlements that sprung up from the desert like weeds, pressed into the shadows at the base of a cliff, or nestled in the relative safety of a crack in the earth.

At last his voice faltered, and he ground to a halt and frowned in disconcerted surprise. How long had he been talking? "That's, um…that's about it."

Furiosa huffed what might have been a laugh. "You know, you sure can talk once you get going."

It took him a moment to recognise her tone. _Teasing_. He grunted and tucked his chin into the blanket. "Hmm."

 _Retorts_. Now there was definitely something he could improve on.

* * *

They stayed there for what must have been a good two hours. Max seemed to have talked himself out, so mostly they just sat in silence, sharing each other's company and the cool night air.

Furiosa watched the stars, listening as Max's breathing slowed. She couldn't let him fall asleep here, as much as she would have liked to – in a few hours it would be dawn, and neither he nor the Pups who stood lookout in the skull would appreciate having to share the space. Besides, he'd likely catch a chill, and then Cheedo would look at Furiosa with those damned big eyes of hers and make her feel like she'd sentenced the Fool to death.

"You alright now?" she asked softly.

He startled – so he _had_ been dozing – and blinked groggily for a moment or two, coming back to the present. Then he nodded, if a little reluctantly, and started clambering to his feet.

Furiosa stood to help him. "You don't have to go back to the infirmary, if you don't want."

He frowned enquiringly at her. _I don't want_.

"There are rooms, up near me and the Sisters. More windows. More air. I can take you, if you'd like." He seemed to hesitate, still frowning. "There's plenty of space," she added. "And it's not far."

The Sisters had made a silent, unanimous decision to avoid Joe's old quarters, instead laying claim to a small network of rooms previously reserved for Joe's sons Rictus and Corpus. Corpus, at first an unwilling ally and now an unquestioned part of their regime, had relinquished his quarters in favour of a west-facing chamber that caught the afternoon sun. And so the girls had stripped and scrubbed every trace of Joe from the rooms and filled the shelves with books and greenery, and never visited the Vault if they could help it. Furiosa had picked out a nearby room, small and simple, with one window and a bed facing the door and easy access to the stairs – they'd won the Citadel, but old habits died hard.

Max considered her offer for a few seconds, shifting awkwardly. "Wouldn't want to be no trouble…"

Furiosa cut him off with an exasperated sigh. "It's no trouble, Max. Least I can do." The rest of her words hung unspoken in the air. _For saving us. For saving me. For your blood_. Surely he knew she'd do much more for him. They all would.

Max looked down and hummed an acquiescence low in his throat. He was uncomfortable with kindness. Debt, he understood.

"Good," said Furiosa, and took his arm again.

* * *

 **Damn, that was a monster chapter! I apologise for any inconsistencies! I finished this in a bit of a rush. Thank you again to all of you who have given kudos or comments. You honestly make my day :)**


	7. Lady Liberty

They saw an improvement in Max's vision the very next afternoon.

He had ventured out of his room to join them for a late lunch – assured by the Sisters that the usual midday crowds of People and War Boys were already dispersed. He still looked a sight – hair long, beard scruffy, the bandages around his shoulder peaking out from the collar of his new shirt – but at least he'd lost that wild-eyed, hunted look from the night before. Capable sat him down next to Furiosa with a plate of bean paste and potato, and laughed a little when he made an appreciative sound at the taste.

"There's plenty more where that came from," grinned Dag. She still had her sunhat on and her forehead was streaked with brown and green from the gardens, testament to the morning she'd spent tending her crops. Cheedo, tutting at the dirt, received a defiant kiss on the lips for her attempts to clean it away. "If they keep shootin' up like they've been doing we might be serving you tomato in a few days." Dag narrowed her eyes. " _If_ you don't disappear on us again."

Capable sighed, and Cheedo slapped Dag's shoulder, but the white-haired Sister looked unrepentant and watched Max's reaction intently. From the uncomfortable hunch of his shoulders he didn't have a good response. Furiosa had guessed as much.

Toast, always kind in her own brusque way, steered the conversation in another direction. She and the Vuvalini Servo had a running competition over who could field-strip a pistol the quickest. Servo, of course, had decades of experience under her belt, and in previous months left Toast in the dust, cackling at the Sister's frustration. But Toast was young, and stubborn, and spent her evenings dismantling and rebuilding guns until the barest second separated her from Servo.

"Give me another week and we'll see who leaves who in the dust," Toast said, her jaw set wilfully.

Furiosa believed her, and suspected Servo did too – but there would be no fun in admitting it. Instead the old Vuvalini smiled, all teeth, and shrugged her narrow shoulders. "Keep dreamin', love."

The Sisters all laughed at Toast's sour expression, and the discussion turned to Capable's War Pups – just Pups now, really, but names were hard to forget. Furiosa listened absently to the ebb and flow of the conversation, savouring her meal.

"Furiosa."

She looked up sharply at the sound of her name in the Fool's rough voice. It was the first time he'd ever _used_ her name, to the best of her knowledge, and he said it like he wasn't quite sure if he was allowed to. He was staring right back at her – _right_ _back_ at her – brow furrowed in concentration and hesitant relief. Comprehension dawned. He could _see_ her.

"Hey," she smiled.

He almost-smiled back. "Hey."

The rest of the table looked around curiously. Cheedo was the first to figure out what had happened, sucking in an excited breath and scrambling over to Max's side. "Do you mind if I have a look?" When Max nodded his consent she leaned in and carefully probed around his eyes, placing a gentle hand on his shoulder when he twitched.

"The redness has gone down," she murmured, turning to Yarra for confirmation.

The old Vuvalini squinted across the table. Cheedo was more than competent now – she'd had to be – but she still appreciated a second opinion when she could get one. Yarra seemed to agree with her assessment. "Fast healer," she observed approvingly.

Cheedo caught Furiosa's eye and gave a tight little smile – they had both seen 'HEALS FAST' tattooed across Max's back in cruel, clinical letters.

By sunset Max was walking on his own, trailing Furiosa with cautious steps as she led him down to her most frequented workshop. It was quieter this late in the afternoon, only a few Blackthumbs restoring broken engines or Repair Boys cobbling together new lengths of pipe for the water system. Still, it was busy enough to put Max on edge. He stuck to Furiosa like a second shadow, eyeing War Boy and workbench alike with a mixture of suspicion and interest, keeping his back to the wall when they finally reached her usual spot. Furiosa said nothing – she didn't have the words, anyway, to tell the Fool what he already knew (that he was safe with her) – only offered her proximity as a gesture of reassurance, brushing just close enough to bump shoulders as she stepped around him.

She gestured for Max to take a seat on the little stool beside the workbench. "Might be easier if you take off the brace."

"Mm." He sat awkwardly – only half, she suspected, from his wounds – and began unfastening the brace, struggling a little between his poor eyesight and the apparent stiffness of the buckles. As he did so Furiosa quickly assessed the damage – several of the struts would have to be replaced, and the leather straps too. The padded bands around his knee and ankle looked in good knick, so she'd keep those intact if she could. She knew from experience that adjusting to new hardware was an uncomfortable task.

He handed the brace over to Furiosa and made to join her at the workbench, pushing himself up from the stool with a wince. Furiosa nudged him gently with her knee.

"I've got this."

Max frowned at her, paused hallway to his feet. "I can help."

Furiosa raised her eyebrows doubtfully. Max said nothing, still staring like he wanted an explanation. "I just raised my eyebrows," Furiosa sighed.

"Shit." He lowered himself back onto the stool with a grimace. "Vision still got room for improvement."

Furiosa snorted. "Just a bit." She laid the brace out on the table, clucking her tongue absently at its state of ruin. Her brain was already churning out suggestions, possible modifications, ways to make the struts more supportive. It had been too long since she'd buried herself in work like this. "I'll rig up a prototype, let you tweak it at the end, yeah? Then you can complain all you want about my adjustments."

She watched with some amusement as his frown deepened – and then relaxed once he registered her comment as a _joke_. "Fine," he said grudgingly, and leant back against the wall, his arms crossed in a way that reminded Furiosa distinctly of Capable at her most obstinate. "What do you want me to do?"

Furiosa shrugged. "Just sit."

Max grunted his dissatisfaction, and Furiosa's lips twitched into a smile. _Fool_. He wouldn't be happy until he had a job. "You could...talk. If you wanted."

 _That_ startled her as much as it startled him. He looked at her from beneath his lowered brows like he thought she might be teasing him.

Furiosa shrugged again and turned back to her workbench. "It's nice when you talk, is all." She didn't say that the sound of his voice was inexplicably relaxing, a low, steady rumble like the murmur of an engine, or that his stumbling reports of the wastelands had been like a breath of fresh air after too long stuck inside.

"Oh." She heard him shift uncomfortably. "I, uh…not got much else to say." There was a long silence, broken only by the clink of metal against metal as Furiosa began work on the brace. It was a simple enough job – especially when compared to the task of fashioning a prosthetic arm. She'd chosen suitable replacement components and started dismantling the brace by the time Max spoke again.

" _You_ talk."

There was a challenge in his tone, hidden under all the usual gruffness. His meaning was clear – why am _I_ doing all the work? Furiosa smiled. "Have it your way, then."

The Sisters had already told Max of the Citadel, of the gardens and the walls and the People, and the work they'd done to build a Green Place out of a hell-hole. So Furiosa told him about the girls instead; how they'd filled the space left by Joe and pulled others up to join them.

How Capable had approached Corpus their first week in the Citadel, flanked by her new escort of loyal Pups, and told him – not unkindly, but with steel in her eyes – that an alliance was his only chance of survival. How she saw a bit of Nux in every War Boy, and taught them to think freely and love bravely, and smiled like the sun when a group of young girls asked to join the Blackthumbs. How the People named her _Fireflower_ and the War Boys called her _Red_ , but when she visited the campfires and spun tales of warrior princesses and gentle knights they sometimes called her _Teller_ in reverent, affectionate tones.

How Dag had thrown herself at the gardens with an almost desperate intensity, taking out her pregnant nerves on stubborn weeds and sour earth, tending to her crops with a scatter-brained kind of efficiency. How she'd gathered around her a veritable army of People and ex-Mothers and the occasional War Boy who dedicated themselves to making things grow – making things _green_ – and who quickly became a tight-knit sort of family (albeit given to arguing fiercely over beans). How her labour had been long and difficult, but Angharad was born healthy and whole, a rust-coloured birthmark blooming like a flower across one shoulder and a set of lungs on her that earned her the nickname "Tiny Terror".

(Max grunted his amusement at that, his eyes fixed on something very far away.)

She told him how Cheedo had taken to carrying a knife tucked away inside her boot – "Just in case," she'd said defensively, as if she had anything to be defensive about – and asked Toast to teach her to shoot. How she was the only one willing to venture frequently into the Vault, walking in with her head held high to ferry out treasured books for her sisters or run her hands pensively along Angharad's painted rebellions, always aware of what they'd come from and what they'd left behind. How the People _adored_ Cheedo, one of their own, who healed their wounds and laughed at their stories and listened patiently to their complaints with genuine concern.

How Toast's sharp tongue had more diplomatic uses than corralling unruly War Boys – she'd been invaluable in arranging trade agreements with Gas Town and the Bullet Farm, playing the good cop (blasé but reasonable) to Furiosa's bad one (aggressive and unrelenting). How in between training and organising work rosters she'd come to a grudging partnership with Corpus Colossus, collecting and arranging all the Citadel's literature, becoming as she did so a new kind of History Woman, inking parchment instead of skin. How she remembered Angharad's words as well as her Sisters – _no unnecessary killing_ – but she demanded the skills to defend her home should exceptions present themselves (and how, inevitably, they did).

"What about you?" Max asked, pointing at her for good measure. "What do you do?"

Furiosa hesitated. What _did_ she do? "Bit of everything," she said eventually, because it was true. "Technically I'm the War Commander, I think, but we don't do war much anymore." Her flesh fingers tapped a restless rhythm on the tabletop. "I go where I'm needed."

"So, um…you don't – rule?"

"No." Her voice came out sharper than she'd intended, used to answering the same question from Pups and War Boys and People. She continued in a softer tone. "There's a council. Me, the Sisters, representatives from the Mothers and the War Boys and the different guilds of People. We try to get opinions from every corner of the Citadel."

"And that… _works_?"

The doubt in his voice was enough to make Furiosa smile tiredly. She'd wondered the same thing when the Sisters had proposed it. "It's messy, but yeah, it works."

Talking was…nice. Furiosa had never been _loquacious_ by anyone's standards – she was a better listener, a better observer – but Max hummed in all the right silences and nodded along agreeably, and the time seemed to pass quicker than it would have in solitude. By the time she ran out of things to say she'd all but finished her work on the brace.

Max took his time inspecting the finished product once she offered it to him. She leant against the workbench while he turned it over in his hands, watching as he manoeuvred the joints experimentally, face impassive. Furiosa had thought she'd done a decent job, but hell, who knew what the Fool would think.

At last he looked up with a solemn expression. "It's better," he said, and nodded slowly. "Better than before."

 _That_ was a compliment and a half, she thought. "Try it on before you thank me."

She needn't have worried. The brace fit snug and comfortable, requiring only the slightest of adjustments. Max stood obediently still as she tightened the necessary joints, waiting for him to hum confirmation before she moved to the next correction, occasionally waving for him to take a few trial paces. Eventually he stepped back and cleared his throat. "Thank you."

Furiosa rose from her crouch and dusted off her knees, making a face at the sound of bones creaking. "Least I can do. Should've put a maker's mark on it. Get a name for myself."

She was pleasantly surprised when he huffed a laugh, a low, coarse sound that made her smile in return. "Don't have to worry about that."

"What?"

"Getting a name for yourself."

Furiosa grimaced. "Yeah." She'd overheard the nicknames, the titles assigned to her by the People. _Boltcutter_ wasn't so bad. _Lady Liberty_ was probably her least favourite. She tried to stamp them out wherever she heard them – all in all, they sounded too much like _Immortan_ for her liking. She asked them to call her Furiosa, or commander, if they must. The War Boys called her _boss_ like nothing had really changed.

A quick glance out the nearest window revealed the sun had well and truly set, and that they were, in fact, the last ones in the workshop.

"Hungry?" she asked Max.

He dipped his head, raising his eyebrows just the tiniest bit. Furiosa sighed in mock exasperation. _Of course he was hungry_. That wasn't a question you asked anyone in the wasteland.

Max walked beside her as she led them back up to the mess hall. He'd fall behind every so often, taking a moment to stare down at his brace and hum approvingly, before ambling to catch up. It wasn't until they were on the final flight of stairs that he spoke. "So…Lady Liberty."

Furiosa froze mid-step, narrowing her eyes at him. He looked very pleased with himself. "Where did you hear that?" He'd been in the Citadel for less than three days, and asleep for most of them as well.

Max shrugged. "The girls. They came to visit. Told me about, mm…" He gestured awkwardly at her.

The thought of the Sisters spending time with Max was a nice one. The thought of them gossiping about her was not. She was used to being talked about, behind her back or otherwise, but it was different with people she actually _cared_ for. Who knew what the girls had told the Fool.

Then, to confirm her worries: "They, uh…said you almost punched the first War Boy who called you Immortan."

She tried to hide her smile in a glare and wasn't completely successful. Those damned blue eyes of his were _laughing_ at her. "Yeah, well. I'll be having strong words with certain people tonight."

She shook her head and started up the stairs again, doing her best not to notice Max's grin.

* * *

 **Sorry for the wait! I started back at uni and the workload is already kicking me in the butt. As always, many many thanks to those who have commented or given kudos! I love and appreciate every single one of you.**

 **On a slightly different note: I'll soon be starting another Mad Max fic (a dumb, self-indulgent domestic AU) so updates for 'A Way Back Home' might take a smidgeon longer than they have been. But! I have by no means forgotten this fic! I have a lot more planned c:**

 **ALSO: I remember seeing the name 'Boltcutter' thrown around in regards to Furiosa, but I can't for the life of me remember WHERE. If it was you, just let me know and I will give you proper credit!**


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